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FreshPaintMagazine
Issue 2 • January 2014
www.freshpaintmagazine.com
2
ARTIST SPOTLIGHT
04 Work, Art and Espionage:
The Balancing Act of Michael Kalmbach By
Ekaterina Popova
ARTICLES
09 Art in a Post- Secular
Society By Atticus Bailey
ARTISTS
14 Melissa Wilkinson
16 Amy Bouse
18 Francine Fox
22 Lauren Rinaldi
24 Benjamin Rogers
28 Christine Abbott
30 J Neil Lawley
32 Cathy Breslaw
34 Emily Royer
36 Jennine Scarboro
38 Lydia Larson
42 Casey Snyder
44 Erin Hinz
46 Max Manning
48 Jave Gakumei Yoshimoto
50 Maria Frati
FROM THE EDITOR
Dear Reader,
We are excited to offer you the second issue of
Fresh Paint Magazine. As promised, we added an
article section, which covers art related topics and
events. In this issue, we interview Michael Kalmbach, a painter who uses his skills in the arts and
administration to better the Wilmington, DE community. In addition, Atticus Bailey offers a critical
look at today’s art world in his essay “Art in a
Post-Secular Society.”
Our passion continues to be providing exposure
to emerging artists and writers, by promoting their
work through this publication, social media and
community partnership.
Sincerely,
Publisher and Editor
Ekaterina Popova
Associate Editor
Amanda Shrawder
Contributing Writer
Atticus Bailey
Featured Artist
Michael Kalmbach
Contact us:
freshpaintmagazine@gmail.com
on the cover: Benjamin Rogers, The
Perfect Romance of High Morality, oil
on canvas, 36x438, 2010
www.freshpaintmagazine.com 3
Work, Art and
Espionage:
The Balancing Act of Michael
Kalmbach
By Ekaterina Popova
Michael Kalmbach is an
important figure in the Wilmington,
DE art community. He is an artist,
but spends a lot of his time creating opportunities for other creatives in the Greater Philadelphia
Area. Since graduating from University of Delaware in 2008, Michael has founded The New Wilmington Art Association (NWAA),
an organization that enabled artists to exhibit their work in the vacant storefront properties of
Downtown Wilmington. Dozens of
exciting, experimental, and contemporary exhibitions took place
through this organization. Michael
also assisted in creating the Shipley Lofts, the only aﬀordable artist
housing project in Wilmington.
Kalmbach is currently the
director of the Creative Vision Factory, which was founded for individuals with behavioral health disorders to find healing and selfexpression through the arts. Michael’s creativity and drive in the
art community, as well as in his
own art, are an inspiration to
many. He simultaneously manages
to raise a family, create opportunities, and be an artist. He shares
thoughts behind his new work,
recent solo exhibition, and exciting upcoming projects in Wilmington with Fresh Paint.
FP: Explain your creative process: inspiration, process, and materials.
MK: Since graduating from the University of
Delaware MFA program in 2008, I have
come to view my painting practice as a
private affair. As an artist in the public, I’m
primarily viewed as an arts administrator,
advocate, and organizer—this is born from
my social and economic standing—I’m not
of the class that can be a full-time painter
while simultaneously raising a family. But I
am of the class that can afford to tinker in
the basement, so painting has taken on the
secrecy of late-nights, and the works, I
imagine, share signatures similar to a bomb
maker. Espionage, like art making, is a
hyper-self-reflexive practice. These musings
on the term tradecraft had me take a look
at the various techniques that I have developed over the years. In reflecting on the
characteristics of my own tradecraft, it became clear that the list would include: accumulations, process-based works, the
hard-edge taping of my earliest paintings,
gestural-brush-strokes (that try to be ironic,
but are, for the most part, sincere), preoccupations with late-modernist painters,
and most importantly the associative power
of color. These techniques do very little to
ensure my survival and economic vitality,
but they do afford me membership to a
community; a community that I serve by
day through the languages of administration, policy, and planning.
FP: Tell us about your recent exhibition at
Project Space in Wilmington, DE. What is
your new work about? MK: I organized this show under the title
TRADECRAFT. The term has been made
popular by Tom Clancy novels, and it was
thrown around quite a bit in the film Zero
Dark Thirty. Tradecraft is a set of skills acquired through experience in a typically clandestine trade. Within the intelligence community the term refers to techniques used in
espionage, in the Clancy novels and in Zero
Dark Thirty, the characters often comment on
others’ tradecraft, acknowledging techniques
unique to specific nations and intelligence
organizations. By day, I live a certain life that
revolves around work, community, and family,
but under the cover of darkness, a very different language guides me. I utilize my training in the production of symbols. These symbols trigger discussions with other similarly
trained individuals in a reception setting—one’s tradecraft becomes the vehicle to
navigate a world that’s as opaque as the intelligence community. It turns out that being
an artist with student loans is a lot like being
a spy.
Image courtesy of Michael Kalmbach
FP: Do you feel your practice is changing, and if so, how? MK: The new work marks a return to
more traditional surfaces. Since 2007,
I’ve been painting on the backside of a
plastic film, an acetate alternative called
Dura-Lar. I wanted to get away from this.
I also wanted to build a more traditional
surface, to be responsible to it again. I
felt like I was letting the Dura-Lar do all
the work. Painting on it is like painting on
glass—the layering is backwards and the
material eliminates texture and creates
this amazing saturation of color. Having
been immersed in this process for several years, I thought that it would somehow inform the return to canvas and
panel.
FP: Who/what has been your biggest
influence(s)?
MK: I certainly think and paint in response to the voices of all the advisors,
students, and faculty that I’ve come to
know.
In terms of painters, I love Frank
Stella’s early work, Ellsworth Kelly, Agnes Martin, Byron Kim, James Siena,
and David Reed, although Yayoi Kusama and Mike Kelley are my favorite
artists. At this point in time the artist
that I most admire, and who is having
the greatest influence on the work that
I do by day, is the Founder of AS220 in
Providence, Rhode Island, Bert
Crenca. Bert has created something in
AS220 that is more important than any
particular body of work—he has created a new social and economic infrastructure that is enabling artists to live.
His life and work is the single most
important example of how to insert
oneself into the community as an artist.
Art departments across the country
need to expose their graduates to the
AS220 model. Community and economic development efforts in every
American city need to visit Bert and
see what he has accomplished in
Providence.
FP: You are an important player in the
Delaware Art Community, what projects
have you been involved in recently?
MK: Thanks for the compliment. The Creative Vision Factory is going to blow-minds
in 2014! Our program is rapidly growing
and we’re looking to build off the success
of two murals that we completed in 2013.
The Kalmar Nyckel Mural was a huge undertaking (20’ x 220’ exterior wall) and
really set the stage of what our program
and our artists are capable of—it was a
great coming-out project. Most importantly
the mural generated income for our members and facilitated the creation of Creative
Vision Works. Through this program we will
work with a group of trained members on
public murals, commercial and residential
painting projects, and façade improvements.
We’re currently working of a project in partnership
with the Wilmington Police Department where we’ll install
large-scale paintings on masonite in the windows of the first
floor vacant retail space on the 400 block of North Market
Street. This block was recently developed and historically preserved—the exterior paint on the buildings boasts a widearray of historically accurate color-schemes. We plan to bring
that color into the windows through a series of playful Josef
Albers and Frank Stella-like compositions.
The Creative Vision Factory will also be well represented in an
upcoming exhibition titled Wilmington TrapStars: A Street Art
Exhibition at the Delaware Center for the Contemporary Arts.
I’ve been on the planning committee for this exhibition, which
was the brainchild of University of Delaware Professor, Dr.
Yasser Payne. Payne is a nationally recognized street ethnographer who recently completed a first of its kind study of
the Wilmington Communities of Southbridge and the Eastside.
This collaboration speaks to the amazing network of talent
that is actively working towards the creation of a more resilient
and just City of Wilmington.
I continue to work with Shipley Lofts through the Chris White
Community Development Corporation, an organization of which
I am now the Board Chairman. The Chris White CDC will be
launching a new website soon, which will raise awareness of
Wilmington’s only artist live/work space, Shipley Lofts. Eighteen
of the 23 units are subsidized for low-income artists. Also keep
an eye out for Wilmington STIR 6. This micro-grant dinner initiative provides funding for projects that better the City of Wilmington—the past 3 dinners each have generated grants of $1500.
STIR 6 will take place sometime this spring, and now that I’m a
homeowner in Newark, I’m looking to start a Newark STIR as
well, stay tuned.
For more information on Michael Kalmbach, The Creative
Vision Factory, and Wilmington Stir, please visit the following
websites:
http://www.michaelkalmbach.com
http://thecreativevisionfactory.org/
http://wilmingtonstir.org
12 3
Art in a PostSecular Society
By Atticus Bailey
Recently there has been a tremendous amount
of scholarship dedicated to the proposition of “postsecularism.” Sociologists, cultural theorists, and the
like have attempted to explain why western societies
have not been able to eliminate religion, but more importantly, why religion within these western societies
continues to thrive and grow despite the emphasis
placed on the progress and propagation of modernism
and secularism. Current thought has changed from
thinking that the continued existence of religion in a
society is a fluke into acknowledging and recognizing
the importance religion plays in western society. Jürgen
Habermas, in the article “Notes on a Post-Secular Society,” states:
In these societies, religion maintains a
public influence and relevance, while
the secularistic certainty that religion
will disappear worldwide in the course
of modernisation is losing ground. If
we henceforth adopt the perspective
of participants, however, we face a
quite different, namely normative question: How should we see ourselves as
members of a post-secular society and
what must we reciprocally expect from
one another in order to ensure that in
firmly entrenched nation states, social
relations remain civil despite the
growth of a plurality of cultures and
religious world views?1
Yet, the focus of this article is not the inclusion or rejection of religious elements in contemporary art, which
might be an article for another day, but rather on what a
“reciprocal civility” means to contemporary art2.
1
2
3 The acknowledgement “of a plurality of cultures and
religious world views” spells the death of post-modernism.
Post-modernism, as defined by the Public Broadcasting
Service (PBS), is “ […] a recognition that reality is not simply mirrored in human understanding of it, but rather, is
constructed as the mind tries to understand its own particular and personal reality. For this reason, postmodernism
is highly skeptical of explanations which claim to be valid
for all groups, cultures, traditions, or races, and instead
focuses on the relative truths of each person.”3 It is important to note that post-modernism is correct in the thesis
that no explanation can be applicable to all groups; however, in reaching the conclusion that each explanation is
only applicable to the individual, post-modernism inherently
denies each individual in a group the commonality of explanations with other individuals in that group. Therefore,
post-modernism arrives at the faulty conclusion that there
can be no agreement among individuals within a group,
which is not only obviously false, but also offensive to the
group.
Within the realm of art, post-modernism revealed
itself in the fashion of abandoning any attempts at a collective definition of art. As illustrated by Marcel Duchamp’s
“Ready-Made Art,” determining the definition of art became the responsibility of each individual, including both
the artist and the viewer. The obvious conclusion of the
movement was the inclusion of anything and everything as
art; there not only became no distinction between amateur
and artist, but art lost its economic and intellectual value.
The result was the alienation and loss of the audience. Of
course, museums and galleries continue to have patrons
each and every day, but there is radical difference between
viewing art and purchasing art.
Habermas, Jürgen. “Notes on a Post-Secular Society.” signandsight.com June 18, 2008.
The term “art” as used in this article is intended to include the elements of fine art such as painting, drawing, sculpture, ceramics, photography, etc., but does not include literature, music, film, etc.
“Postmodernism.” Public Broadcasting Service. pbs.org www.freshpaintmagazine.com 9
45 6 7
Yet, more importantly, in both museums and galleries,
especially established galleries, a definition of art was
provided by the institution, the public could trust that
the objects contained in the museum or gallery were
actually art because of the authority of the location. Julian Spaulding, after questioning Damien Hirst’s art, was
banned from Hirst’s exhibition at the Tate Modern art
gallery in London.4 Therefore, art actually became more
rigidly defined than was ever the intention of postmodernism. Because the public could only know that
an object was art because of its location, it became
tremendously more difficult for new artists to become
accepted as artists because of the limitations of how
and where they showed their art work. Gagosian Gallery
recently showed a selection of William Eggleston’s photography in the show “At Zenith.” Yet, one has to ask
what the difference is between Eggleston’s photographs
of clouds and the thousands of pictures posted every
day on Flickr?
In post-modernism, art gave up intellectual and
economic value for “artistic freedom,” or individual
meaning and preference. Of course, one could argue
that having artistic freedom actually increases intellectual value, but the opposite happens: intellect only has
value when in conjunction with others. Descartes’ famous epistemology “cogito, ergo sum” (I think, therefore I am) only proves one’s existence to one’s self,
more is needed to prove one’s existence to someone
else.5 Similarly, art needs to have value to others, not
just the artist, to have intellectual value. Consequently,
if art has intellectual value, then economical value is
more likely to occur. Purchasing art is essentially exchanging a cultural capital for an economic capital, but
a purchase obviously requires two individuals in the
transaction.
Power is redistributed in a post-secular society.
Under post-modernism, power supposedly was held by
the individual, but as illustrated with the example of art
galleries and museums, power was actually held by a
few select, established institutions.
(“If This is Art?” by Maciej Ratajski) 6
In a post-secular society, because of the need for
civil reciprocity, cultures and worldviews now hold power,
which in turns actually provides power to the individuals
within that a group. The result is that individuals are now
not only free to believe as they wish, but also that the
individuals must be respected despite their beliefs. Essentially, a post-secular society depends on Adam
Smith’s theory of moral sentiments for its beneficial continuation; respect and civility are the objects of an exchange, one gives respect in order to receive respect.7
In a society of a plurality of cultures and worldviews,
power is distributed from a few select institutions to a
multitude of groups, with each group allowed the freedom to believe as they will but also with the responsibility
to allow other groups the opportunity to believe differently than they do.
The plurality of cultures and world views affects
art in a plethora of ways. Art in a post-secular society
gains what post-modernism took away: definitions, not a
single definition, but a plurality of definitions. Maciej
Ratajski is correct, “If this is art, then what isn’t?” If
anything can be defined as art, then art has no value
because while it can reach the pinnacle of perfection it
can also reach the lowest depth of degradation.
4
Spaulding, Julian. “It Stinks! Art critic Julian Spaulding was banned from Damien Hirst’s Tate exhibition after calling him a talentless conman … but we smuggled him in- and here’s his verdict.” Mail Online. April 7, 2012. dailymail.co.uk
5
Descartes, René. “Cogito, ergo sum.” Encyclopædia Britannica. britannica.com
6
Ratajski, Maciej. “If This is Art?” maciejratajski.com (used with permission of the artist).
7
Smith, Adam. The Theory of Moral Sentiments. The Online Library of Liberty. oll.libertyfund.org
8 9
Art, under post-modernism, is Schrödinger’s cat, and
few are willing to purchase the box to find out what
happened to it.8 In a post-secular society, the artist now
has a means of a creating art that is acknowledged,
recognized, and accepted as art outside of museums
and galleries, but without adhering to a singular archaic,
aesthetic definition of art. A post-secular society allows
for a plurality of definitions, not just the definition of the
artist or of an institution such as a museum or gallery.
The result is the enlargement of the art community, both
of artists that would never have been previously
considered artists, but also, and maybe more
importantly, patrons. The public, now empowered to
determine the definition of art instead of being told a
definition, are more likely to invest in art because they
recognize and understand the intellectual value of an
object. Once an object is given intellectual value, it has
obtained the status of a cultural capital, which then can
be exchanged for an economic capital.
The public gains the power to question and challenge
the intellectual and civil integrity of both the art object
and the artist, forcing the art and the artist to become
less meretricious. The artist, communicating through
the medium of art, is accountable for the discourse that
takes place. Art, therefore, returns to one of its original
purposes: a medium of communication. Under postmodernism, art was not interested in communication in
the form of a dialogue with the public; but in a postsecular society, the public has the right to a civil
discourse concerning the art object. In a post-secular
society, Ratajski’s piece “If This is Art?” will not remain a
rhetorical question, but will receive the answer it seeks.
The importance of the economics of art cannot
be ignored. Art, from an epistemological perspective,
reaches its fulfillment in an economic exchange; as with
any occupation, the product of employment is intended
to produce an economic return greater than the initial
effort. Yet, perhaps more importantly, with the primary
focus of the political culture on the rising debt of the
nation, it is only a matter of time before government 9
funding of art is discontinued. As can be seen by the
reduction of art programs in public schools, art is one of
the first areas to be severed from government funding.
Therefore, art will eventually become primarily supported by the public and, subjected to the principles of
supply and demand. The artist has to provide a product, the art object, that has intellectual and cultural
value worthy of an exchange for an economic capital.
But with intellectual and cultural value, the artist is now
held accountable for the art object. As a result, if the
art object is disrespectful to a culture or world view, the
artist is responsible for the breech in civil reciprocity.
8
9
Kramer, Melody. “The Physics Behind Schrödinger’s Cat.” National Geographic. nationalgeographic.com August 12, 2013.
Meaning federal, state and local governments.
FreshPaintArtists
Melissa Wilkinson
Amy Bouse
Francine Fox
Lauren Rinaldi
Benjamin Rogers
Christine Abbott
J Neil Lawley
Cathy Breslaw
Emily Royer
Jennine Scarboro
Lydia Larson
Casey Snyder
Erin Hinz
Max Manning
Jave Gakumei Yoshimoto
Maria Frati
Melissa Wilkinson
My current body of work focuses on the aftermath of both man made
and natural disasters. I archive, appropriate, then digitally manipulate
found photographs. I situate these images somewhere in between
abstraction and representation in order to create a dialogue with modernist painting through postmodern practice. I draw and paint these
images not only to further slow them down, but to also support traditional notions of the “sublime landscape,” one that is uncontrollably
vast and frightening, within a contemporary context of anxiety and
fear. I choose to focus on moments of reprieve; quiet moments following a climax, where one can assess the physical and emotional
damage created by previous events. I am both drawn to these images and repelled by them. They speak of a time where agenda setting, political rhetoric and consumption are perpetuated and often
manufactured by the media. As mass media sets the psychological
and emotional tone for life as we know it, I work in an attempt to differentiate neurosis from my own understanding of reality. My work is built on an interest in social commentary and the undercurrents of visual culture. I attempt to investigate its' greater coercive potential through the self conscious, meditative act of drawing and painting. My use of mediation and the reproducible source reinforces my
own understanding of post modernity and the ubiquity of the photographic image in culture today, while manifesting itself in an abstracted
photorealist painting style. I am interested in uncovering a manipulated
collective consciousness by recreating a pre-consumed, transmogrified image. It is through reinterpretation, mediation, manipulation and
context that I change their meanings. www.freshpaintmagazine.com 14
Melissa Wilkinson, Soskin House,
ink wash on paper, 22x30, 2013
http://www.melissawilkinson.net
MFA
Southern Illinois
University
BFA
Western Illinois University
Melissa Wilkinson, Ruin I, ink wash on paper, 30x 35 2013
Amy Bouse, Hoops 06, acrylic, ink, graphite and pastel on paper, 23.5 x 33, 2013
FreshPaint
www.amybouse.com
Amy Bouse
MFA University of Washington
BFA University of California, San
Diego
Amy Bouse, Hoops 04, acrylic, ink, graphite and pastel on paper, 23.5 x 33, 2013
My compositions usually begin with a concept or question and then
follow how forms evolve, age and negotiate. Boundaries often attain
central focus because these areas of negotiation and transformation
reflect a story told over time. Narrative, as well as memory, play a
large part in my work; I am curious about the structure and psychology of
our methods to record, organize and retain information. I borrow tools
from the Abstract Expressionists to record these stories: the immediacy of
the gesture, the respect for the medium, the painterly vocabulary. Forms in
my work often relate to our physical world, specifically geography and botany; they emerge, collide, disappear and react as representatives of a
transitory and unpredictable existence.
Francine Fox, Surrender Season, 10.5 x 20.5, graphite on gaper, 2012
Francine Fox, 115 Cardinals, watercolor, graphite, palm ash and white charcoal on paper, 15.5 x 21.5,
www.francinefox.net
Francine Fox
MFA University of Delaware
BFA
Kutztown University of
Pennsylvania
“I explore spaces between
the notions of physical and
metaphysical, rationality
and faith, chaos and order,
and the individual and the
collective.”
Rooted in a curiosity about the mechanics of liminals, I explore spaces between
the notions of physical and metaphysical,
rationality and faith, chaos and order, and
the individual and the collective. Records
of the significance and beauty of these
transitional spaces are made through
gently anthropomorphized animal imagery, traditional and personal symbolism, and depictions of invisible forces
through modified and invented charting
symbols.formal and conceptual elements
to parallel and reveal the exquisite intricacies of gray areas between seemingly
dissonant traits.
My influences range from Christian
Schad, Walton Ford, and Giacomo
Brunelli, to Inka Essenhigh, and Ian
Ingram. I use the slick grays and vivid
colors of graphite, oil, watercolor,
gouache, and charcoal to illuminate
lush illusions of texture and elaborate
detail. By way of the invitational nature
of drawings, paintings, and beauty, I
hope to lure viewers into contemplating the cause of wonder, confusion,
and discomfort surrounding gray areas.
www.laurenrinaldi.com
Lauren Rinaldi
BFA
Tyler School of Art of Temple University
My paintings tell intricate and personal stories exploring the meanings of encountering the unexpected through painting. Frequently, through the use of self-portraiture,
I chronicle life through the changes in the
body. The visual language I use tends to
be passively confrontational, intimate and
seductive, yet repugnant in its portrayal.
My most recent paintings have a sort of
dream like quality to them. Like fantasies,
but you don’t know whose fantasies they
are. I’ve drawn inspiration from children’s
books, old Hollywood, art history, meditations, memories, badly written paranormal
romance novels, asana, my house and
my cat.
Lauren Rinaldi, And On Saturday Night She Ate
Everything, oil on canvas, 20 x 20, 2013
Lauren Rinaldi, Apana Way, oil on canvas, 12x12, 2013
Benjamin Rogers, The Perfect Romance of High Morality, oil on canvas, 36x438, 2010
www.benjaminrogersart.com
Benjamin Rogers
24
MFA
Arizona State University
BFA
Northern Kentucky University
“My paintings are self-referential contemplations
that comment on the intersections of my life with
art history, philosophy, implications of what it
means to be an artist, culture and excesses,
while critiquing and indulging my own naïve, selfcentered ego.”
I was seduced by figurative painting
very early in my artistic training and
have always had a keen appreciation for a well crafted representational painting. I see myself following in that tradition, although I am
more interested in accentuating the
artifice of the paint than adhering to
a sort of naturalism. My paintings
are self-referential contemplations
that comment on the intersections
of my life with art history, philosophy, implications of what it means
to be an artist, culture and excesses, while critiquing and indulging my own naïve, self-centered
ego. The paintings are linked
through their visual armature over
which I create narratives whose
space is just as much a character
in the narrative as the figure(s). The
space informs the psychological
tenor of the work and contains cer-
tain attributes or signifiers, which
indicate characteristics of the figures’ identity and story. I use each
piece to communicate distinct
ideas but they all share a visual vocabulary that combines elements of
my favorite artists, art theory, and
thoughts on what painting should
be. I want my work to be amusing
and serious, visually striking and
conceptually alluring, while commenting on multiple facets of life
and the creative process.
Next page: Benjamin Rogers, Inside The Painter's Studio - Painting In The Abbreviated Field, oil on canvas,
45x56, 2012
Christine Abbott, He Remembers that We are Dust, oil on canvas, 48 x 36, 2013
Christine Abbott
www.christinedepiroabbott.com
MFA Washington University in
St. Louis, 2008
BFA Columbus College of Art
2005
“This Island refers to the “islands” I find
myself living on, that is the island of
marriage, the island of a community of
faith, and the islands of vocation, or
residence.”
I am fascinated by the manner in which a
community grows and matures. Collections
of people are formed through circumstances
and/or relationships. What defines a group
as a community are their “island” borders,
even though they may fluctuate dramatically.
The development of an assembly is both
simple numerical addition as well as the
maturation of individuals and their interconnectedness. When I consider a group of
people as an accumulation of utterly unique
individuals with infinite worth rather than parts
of a whole, I am overwhelmed.
Christine Abbott, Listens, oil on canvas, 27x21, 2013
This Island We Live On examines the inevitable but often surprising nature of growth
within community with an autobiographical
emphasis. This Island refers to the “islands” I
find myself living on, that is the island of marriage, the island of a community of faith, and
the islands of vocation, or residence. My island viewpoint is particularly influenced by my
faith and relationships within my faith community.
A range of personal motifs form a dialogue to
represent my understanding of this dynamic
human fluctuation. For example, in the Faces
series, individuals multiply in a gridded format.
Repeated imagery like ladders, bricks and
books symbolize a congregation. In other
works, interiors and images of a couple suggest a more intimate development. Throughout This Island We Live On, saturated paintings and densely layered collages present a
nuanced view of the nature of growth within
community.
J Neil Lawley, installation view
J Neil Lawley
My paintings are explorations of the effects of color proximity on our spatial perception. The work is based on observations through years of making and experiencing art and traveling around the world.
I have seen and taken mental notes on
how different cultures use color and the
significance placed upon them. The colors of these painted mountains (yama in
Japanese) vibrate and oscillate between
foreground and background, causing the
viewer to contemplate the true shape of
the forms.
MFA
Southern Methodist
University
BFA
The University of Texas at
Tyler
30
J Neil Lawley, Daiyamasan (Big Mountain3)), acrylic, spray paint, graphite on found lumber, 36x33, 2013
Cathy Breslaw
I have always been fascinated by the concept of ‘light’ as it is expressed in art but also
how it is perceived in our physical environment. Radiance, translucence, and luminosity are all words that come to mind when
describing thoughts behind the intent of my
work. Just as natural light can warm and
enlighten us, I think of the various layers of
color and transparency experienced in the
materials I use to create my work.
My work engages materiality in many forms.
It has its roots in childhood and the family
fabric business. Spending a multitude of
hours around fabrics of all kinds - seeing
and feeling colors, textures and patterns
presented on an array of fabric types, made
an indelible impression which followed me
into adulthood and into the art I make. So, it
is not surprising that given my years in
southern California light and space, mixed in
with materials, urge me to create mostly
large scale wall, floor and installation works
that reflect the ephemeral transparent lightness of the environment in which I live, highlighting the fragility of life.
www.cathybreslaw.com
MFA Visual Arts, Claremont
Graduate University
BFA The George Washington
University
The work, which references painting, drawing,
and sculpture, draws upon a variety of materials, ideas, and inspiration. In my travels to
Southeast Asia, I located an industrial mesh
that has dominated my work for several years.
The commercial mesh, packed in rolls in roomsized containers is shipped in commercial vessels worldwide. Fascinated by this material, I
visited the factory in Shanghai, and brought the
materials back to my studio where I could experiment, explore and expand its possibilities.
Challenged by the idea of using ordinary, easily
accessible commercial materials, I am always
researching and using related materials for my
work. Around the globe, these materials have
been used in the grocery, construction and
decorative industries and because they are
often made from plastic, have been easily discarded. I repurpose and transform these materials into art pieces that will long endure in private and public spaces.
Cathy Breslaw, Lightness of Being #1, industrial mesh 99 x 96
Emily Royer
I wasn't sure if I understood the motives behind
my actions. Then I listened to a radio program
that confirmed I did not. My actions stem from
biological processes beyond my control. Human
nature. A nature that is not fully understood and
is subject to ongoing debate. We educate ourselves; we are worldly. We are taught, do, and
believe in what is right. But don't take it too seriously. It's whatever you think it is, but it's also
whatever anyone thinks it is. Competing influences and value structures lead to paths that
have more in common than they seem to. There
is a desire for status, sex, power, spectacle; a
yearning for visceral or transcendent experiences.
But also for love, friendship, community, wellbeing, faith, a sense of purpose. We are supposed to command our own lives, but we are still
tied to our natures. I lay the paint down thickly but
quickly. These images don't need a history, future, or context. Instead they are my survey of
the ephemera of our collective natures.
www.emilyroyer.net
BFA
The University of the Arts ,
Philadelphia, PA
Emily Royer, Match, oil on canvas, 40x50, 2012
34
Emily Royer, Dogs Fighting, oil on canvas, 40x40, 2012
Jennine Scarboro, Blonde, 36 x 48, oil, acrylic, graphite, and collage on canvas
Jennine Scarboro
In my “Hideous Siren” paintings I combine tropes of beauty
with aspects of the monster to create female figures in
which fascination and revulsion intersect. Beauty is a potent fantasy celebrated nowhere more than in the Fashion
Magazine. From here I cull: a pert nose, luscious blonde
locks, a set of gleaming teeth, which complete malformedoddities fused from lumps of paint and scribbles of graphite. The monster is a magical creature whose immense
power comes not from exquisite beauty but from hideous
ugliness. The dual being of my painting incorporates these
opposing fantasies, each with its own power. She is at
once horrible and alluring.
www.jenninescarboro.com
MFA
California College of Arts
Jennine Scarboro, Splendor in the Grass, 72 x 60, oil, acrylic, graphite, and collage on canvas
37
www.lydialarsonstudio.com
Lydia Larson
MFA Kendall College of Art and
Design, MI
BFA Montclair State University
I believe there are multiple realities that exist at the same time. I
feel that the physical world is not all there is. I imagine many
simultaneous events that link together in a highly organized
way, even though everything can seem so utterly random.
Perhaps our everyday events fit among a higher order and just
maybe, there is a common thread weaving in and out of the
lines of every history there ever was, tying us all together. Perhaps, we are these very threads stitched into a colorful and
profound synchronistic quilt.
I am interested in the visual possibilities that result from taking
pieces of information that are seemingly not related and translating them into a new image. Within this process is my attempt to forge connections in belief that a grand connection
indeed exists. My most recent work borrows from various histories, images, memories, and tales. Each painting is a little
world, an isolated stage in which a moment will unfold, intimately connecting to the next. I am engaged in an ongoing
investigation concerning: rootlessness, voyages, spiritual
forces, displacement, what it means to sojourn, place, time,
and the great struggle and triumph of communicating.
next pages: Lydia Larson, Prism, oil on canvas, 64 x 96, 2013
38
Lydia Larson, Grotto, oil on canvas, 50x60, 2013
39
Casey Snyder, Able to Convince Myself, 48 x 36, oil and mixed media on panel, 2013
www.csnyderpaint.com
MFA
Kendall College of Art & Design, Grand
Rapids, MI
BFA
Ashland University, OH
Casey Snyder
42
Casey Snyder, Erratic, 17 1/2 x 14, oil and mixed media on panel, 2012
The fluidity of memory, the illusion of reality and our malleable personal identity are questioned through out my work. Memory is mixed with a non-linear environment, allowing
recollections to unfold in a fragmented way. This instability leaves us with a constant
changing self and memory as an impressionable web that is altered by the second.
A dialogue between opposites occurs within my work. Irony is also explored through unclearness, or taking on opposites at one time. I focus on the real and unreal, high value
and low value, exciting and banal, and important and unimportant. I am interested in the
mentality of placing these opposites at the same level of importance. This results in imagery that amass on the picture plane, becoming an assemblage of memory, imagination, and misinformation that have collected overtime. The space that develops appears
to be a place keeper, to hold things that are left behind, or provide a space where images can be set aside in hopes of it being important later. My work often describes a private lexicon of things you have in your head, things you know, lies you told or heard, and
moments from mass media.
Through this glut of imagery and items, I am interested in prompting the past, while fictionalizing it. A construction of meaning is briefly held in place, and the images serve as
prosthesis for meaning. I assemble images in an effort to sort, and categorize, but ultimately exaggerating the fragmentation and incompleteness. Viewers are encouraged to
question truth in narratives, and to create with imagery. I relish in transforming imagery
and leading audiences to take a fresh look at the illusion of memory.
Erin Hinz
In my work, I seek to explore themes of
identity, gender, and sexual subjectivity.
More specifically the work is informed by
Judith Butler’s philosophy of gender and
sexuality and current feminist concerns regarding
social change which a bell
hooks concedes,” …is
intimately linked with the
desire for pleasure and
erotic fulfillment.” The significance of this discourse
within the context of my
paintings is simply that a
sense of entitlement of
one’s body, including
one’s sexuality and bodily
pleasure, as a right, can
serve as a standard for
the capacity to know and
demand other rights. The work is intended
to offer alternative ways of thinking about
gender and sexuality under the present
conditions.
as a site for euphoric physical and psychological self pleasure, a body unencumbered by oppressive hierarchies and
cultural categories having to do with granting others sexual access
to that body. The painting’s psychedelic, hallucinatory space, created by
a spectrum of painting
techniques, are intended
as a way of picturing a
psychological state or interior experience as opposed to describing culturally defined dichotomous notions of female
sexuality. In the end, I
strive to navigate a sense
of being where perceived
forms of gender are always
already and cultural permission is unevenly
allocated.
My work focuses on what this sense of
bodily entitlement might look like. I work to
depict a realm of sexual subjectivity and
agency, a place where one feels entitled
to sexual pleasure and sexual safety. In an
effort to do that, I depict the female body
above: Erin Hinz, Sparkle Motion in Liquid Form, Oil on Canvas, 30 x 40 inches,
Erin Hinz, I Put the Jewel Inside Myself, oil on canvas, 40 x 30 inches, 2013
www.erinhinz.com
MFA University of Notre Dame, IN
“The painting’s psychedelic, hallucinatory space, created by a spectrum of painting techniques, are intended as a way of picturing a psychological state or
BFA Kansas City Art Institute, MO
interior experience as opposed to describing culturally defined dichotomous notions of female sexuality..”
Max Manning, Magenta Funk Bush, acrylic on panel, 23x20, 2013
46
Max Manning
www.maxmanningart.com
MFA University of Cincinnati
BFA
Bowling Green State
University
The artist of today lives in a both cumbersome
pression as well as moments of highly conand liberating realm of infinite resource. Pertrolled focus.
haps the possibility of originality has long been
declared dead. Does that mean the artist shall
My work is a culmination of stolen ideas, isms
forfeit his or her pursuit of creating work that
and a great appreciation for both the history of
could expand the ever-elastic waistband of
painting. Combinations of starkly contrasting
art? Or should they stubbornly persist, along
visual elements melt together to form images
the way borrowing and
of imperfection. This anarstealing the cloaks of past
chic visual dialect that I
styles and the shields of
have chosen to adopt
isms?
speaks to the disorientation
The aim of my work is to
one can experience from
be retro-contemporary but
today’s constant flood of
not retrograde. That is to
technological oversay, that, in my own nastimulation.
iveté, I am optimistic to enBearing in mind the privicounter a dead horse
lege and miracle of this
along the road and beat it
highly developed technoback to life. Once beaten
logical age in which we
back to life, I may attempt
exist, I am interested in
to relate these isms to
how artificial life has becontemporary human excome for so many human
perience. Hopefully, this
beings. The images I creyields allegorical images
ate are depictions of my
Max Manning, Orange Funk Bush, acrylic on
panel, 24x21, 2013
that stand upon the timeown interpretation of the
line of art history with one
struggle that exists befoot in the past and the
tween the visceral, the priother on the present.
mal and the artificiality of contemporary human
experience. Therefore, these images are
Metaphorically the image plane could be
mindscapes that exist in this the once dubbed
viewed as an immovable object, and though
chaotic and teaming universe.
my mind is far from an unstoppable force, it is
my hope that when these two meet, the material evidence of this incident will be an image
of artistic merit. My process is a pendulous
alteration between automatism and analysis.
The canvas will absorb explosions of raw ex-
Jave Yoshimoto, In a New York minute, Gouache on paper, 26"x40", 2013
Jave Gakumei Yoshimoto
My work takes on the ephemerality of news and
information and how the emotions we bring to
each tragedy in the news cycle are swept away
by the wave of information that floods the media. I
address this social amnesia through my art with
the work acting as a social memory for tragic
events so quickly forgotten in our information age.
Employing images of the overwhelming power of
the Japanese tsunami and earthquake to inspire
empathy in the painting’s viewers. I used visual
color blocks and large fields to draw in the audience for a closer view, while the finer details of
the piece keep the audience fixated and allow
them to feel immersed in the painting themselves.
www.javeyoshimoto.com
MFA Syracuse University
BFA
University of California Santa
Barbara
Jave Yoshimoto, Vultures of Fragments Past, Gouache on paper, 26"x40", 2012
“I address this social amnesia
through my art with
the work acting as
a social memory for
tragic events so
quickly forgotten in
our information
age.”
Jave Yoshimoto, Harbinger of Late Winter Day's Dusk, Gouache on paper, 30x41, 2012
49
Maria Frati, mixed media print collage, with cut paper and gouache, 16x20,
Maria Frati
As a printmaker I am always thinking
about the visual power of accumulation–what sort of impact may a repeated shape, line, or image have on a
viewer? What types of forms and patterns can be made through repetitive
mark-making? I am interested in finding
these instances in my surroundings and
deconstructing/reassembling them in
my work. There is a direct relationship
between the way I build form through
repetition and the way things grow organically.
A majority of my pieces utilize animal
imagery as a way to communicate a
story about place. I am interested in
our narrative impulse to make sense
of natural phenomena, or conversely,
our desire to make banal happenings
significant–even magical. My work is
not only about lived experience but
what may be possible, imagined, and
storied.
www.mariafrati.com
MFA Maryland Institute
College of Art
BFA Clark University
Worcester, MA
Maria Frati, mixed media print collage, with cut paper and gouache, 16x20, 2013
51
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above detail: Jennine Scarboro, Splendor in the Grass, 72 x 60, oil, acrylic, graphite, and collage on canvas
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